“The trip of a lifetime” pretty well sums up our most recent venture —North to Alaska.
Over the past year my wife Nancy and I have been planning this vacation. She agreed to participate, much to my surprise, though she reminded me quite a few times that this was my trip and that she was a beach girl.
We booked a cruise with some our long-term friends, Wayne and Lisa Hilton. They have made Alaska a regular part of their travel itinerary for many of the years we have known them. We were having dinner with them one night and the topic came up. We told Lisa to do her magic and put the trip together to include us and she did.
It turned out to be a pretty economical trip because we had booked at one of the high points of Covid when people weren’t traveling much so we were able to get two plane tickets for the cost of one with basically the same deal for the cruise. All together the trip only cost about $3,000 plus whatever we spent along the way. Mind you, Nancy and I don’t splurge on accommodations and had booked economy class on air as well as cabin on the boat. Our take is to spend extra money on the things we want to spend on. We did not spend a lot of time in the cabin so there was no need for a balcony or other amenities. We flew economy because whether you are at the back or front of the plane, you get there at the same time. It is also easier to let the area clear when you get ready to disembark the plane.
We flew out on Sunday morning to Vancouver, British Columbia. I was impressed with my first trip to Canada even though it was for a short stay. We dined in the hotel that evening because our plans were to board the ship early. We booked through Norwegian, which I understood was a bit of an upgrade from the ships we normally take out of New Orleans. The typical number of passengers was 3,000 but in an effort to reduce exposure to Covid, the capacity was lowered to 1,400.
For a little extra we could upgrade from standard ship’s fare so we booked a couple of different places to eat, one of which was a Brazilian steak house. There, waiters brought skewers of grilled meats for your selection. They included beef, lamb, pork and poultry, and it was pretty much “eat until you popped.”
Most mornings we chose to go to the main dining room and order individually, but breakfast included classics like eggs benedict, smoked salmon with cream cheese and thinly sliced onion and a few capers to top it off, or you could go more traditional with freshly prepared egg dishes along with about anything else you could imagine.
Our first port-of-call in Alaska was Ketchikan, where we had booked an excursion to see a lumber jack competition. For some reason I have always enjoyed watching participants compete in log chopping, pole climbing and other events like log rolls. They had two opposing teams, and when a team won they would get an American or a Canadian flag, based on which county the team claimed. Those fellows were talented at wielding their Stilh chainsaws or double bit axes in the throwing competition. It was a full blown show, and while tickets were about $70 each, in my book it was worth every cent.
Parts of the original city of Ketchikan are still in operation as art galleries and several neat little shops.
Our next port was Juneau, which is the capital of Alaska and is only accessible by plane or boat. That puts a unique perspective on things. We had a chance to visit many of the shops and stores and, yes, even a few saloons.
One we spent a little while in was the Red Dog Saloon, where a cranky old timer played the piano and did one-liners. It was pretty funny listening to him heckle the crowd, and the one time I thought he had gone a bit too far was repeated in the subsequent show so that really was part of the show— or so I hoped.
We also took a tram up the mountain from which we could see all the cruise ships moored while passengers explored the town. We visited a museum there that demonstrated the Inuit influence in Alaska. You see that much of their art is associated with the eagle or the raven, which is typical of Alaska’s indigenous people. Incidentally, Inuit children follow the mother’s heritage. If she was of the Raven lineage her children are also, and they have to marry an Eagle other than someone of their father’s clan, and vice versa.
Our final stop for the trip was Skagway and included a visit to Liarsville as well as a chance to pan for gold. Liarsville was so named because newspaper journalists who were sent to cover the gold rush of the late 1800s would hold up there rather than making the trip over the mountains to cover real stories about the gold rush on scene. They took second-hand accounts about the gold rush and crafted stories without ever having visited the gold fields themselves.
The journalists avoided the actual trip through the White Pass because it was so ardurous. The Canadian Mounties made everyone comply with a list of supplies, which weighed 1,200 pounds, before they were allowed to cross. This was to ensure that they had adequate supplies and would not freeze to death along the way.
Our visit to Liarsville was completed with a Salmon Bake. We then boarded a train and went through White’s Pass to the Yukon Route, which the early gold miners followed, except we did so by train rather than on foot as they did.
A major part of the Alaskan economy is now based on tourism. The revenue from shows and activities like this helps to support the local economy. So even though we did pay to participate in some of these events, it was appropriate to give tips also. You can well imagine how Covid-19 has impacted tourism over the past couple of years.
We then boarded the ship again and set up for our last two days at sea but there was still a lot to see and do along the way.
We had the chance to see the killer whales traveling along with the ship in pods, which are small groups. You would watch for blows, which is a small spot of water rising. It then became like a fine vapor and if you were lucky seconds later you might see a whale breach the surface and sometimes witness a splash by the tail of the whale.
We were heading to Glacier Bay. Our route was on the inside of the straits so the sailing was extremely smooth. As we neared you could see masses of ice floating in the bay. These icebergs were not overly large but the rule of thumb is that the third you see on the surface and indicates two- thirds of the iceberg below the surface. The farther we traveled the larger icebergs we saw. A sister ship of the Jewel had struck an iceberg the week before and their trip had to be shortened from damage to the ship. There were reports of people from Simpson County on that ship.
Speaking of people from Simpson County ,after we boarded our flight from Jackson we ran into Robert Reed Miller, who was on his way to Alaska to get in a bit of fishing. He told us he goes every year and had been a guide in Alaska at one time. We had a chance to visit a little until we got to Vancouver.
He sent some pictures later on and had caught some really nice halibut.
The part of the straits were traveling through was probably a couple of miles wide so you could see the shores to either side and view a lot of seals sunning on the small islands along the way.
When we finally made it to Glacier Bay noticable more chunks of ice were noticeable in the water. God’s handiwork is very evident when he created this part of Earth. On the ship in the channel we were surrounded by snowcapped mountains as far as the eye could see. For me it was a breathtaking experience unlike any I have ever experienced before, just having the opportunity to view the grandeur and realizing just how small you are in the big picture of things.
Our last port of call along the way was Seward. It just so happened it was on Monday the Fourth of July. In Seward traditionally on the Fourth runners of all age groups run the Mt. Marathon race. They run up the mountain then make their way down by trails in either a junior race, a men’s race or women’s race. I had seen this before when flipping through television channels, and it was neat to be there during the race. Kids competed probably in the 10 to 12 age range all the way up to the teen years. These young guys and girls were not cutting it any slack. They registered some good times as they raced to 3022 feet above sea level only to race back down, which in many cases meant rolling and tumbling down the course to the finish line.
We rented an automobile with the plans of driving up to fish on the Kenai Peninsula on the Kenai River, which has been another thing on my bucket list. Our destination was Cooper’s Landing and we had booked a guide which almost necessary because they have all knowledge and the equipment. We used Kenai River Fly Fishing, KRFF.
The guide met us the next morning after we arrived. I had awoken during the night at around 11:30 p.m. and glanced outside. It was still light enough to see then, and by about 1:30 a.m. it started getting light again. We grabbed a biscuit along the way and planned to spend the day fishing. Along the way our guide “Magic Mike,” as Nancy called him, pointed out what he referred to as a Swamp Buggy, a small moose grazing along the roadside.
Nancy and I, Wayne and Lisa and Magic Mike put in a skiff and headed downriver. Mike took us past other groups and headed into the canyon.
Nancy was the first to hook one while fishing on a spinning rig. It was a nice Dolly Varden, which is one of the many species of trout found along the river.
The canyon is all part of a national park along the peninsula so it was not long before we were in the wilderness. Every bend of the river seemed to be another natural wonder and appeared to have been taken from a nature magazine. We spotted as many as four bald eagles perched in the branches of some trees, waiting to swoop down on an unsuspecting trout in the rushing waters.
The trip wasn’t exactly accident free. As I was getting into the skiff we were fishing from, I fell and landed on the deck of the boat. I was wedged in and there was no getting up. The guide came over and started untangling me. I told him I was fine, I just couldn’t move because I was pinned between built-ins. After a few minutes he was able to free me and get me on my feet. I can imagine what he was thinking, “What have I gotten myself into?” I redeemed myself when I got a nice fish off.
However, redemption soon played out as I hooked myself through my cap into my head. Mike grinned and said I get to do this deal with monofilament line and it won’t hurt at all—Lies, I said, as he snatched the hook out of my head. He commented that I have a pretty high level of pain tolerance.
We rigged up and went back at it again. At one point, Hilton and I both had fish on at the same time for a double. Before we knew it the four of us all had fish on the line for a quadruple. We got in a full day of fishing and all caught several fish, though we practiced catch-and-release.
The fishing trip was one of my favorite parts of the trip, but our adventures were not over.
Early Wednesday morning he loaded up and headed toward Anchorage with plans to get in 18 holes of golf before we had to head home.
This was supposed to be a surprise to me but the cat got out of the bag earlier in the week so I found out what was going on. I mean, really, who goes to Alaska and doesn’t play golf? We got the girls to go with us as we enjoyed yet another beautiful day in the 49th State.
The guy in the pro-shop told us they were under drought conditions so carts were limited to cart path only. At the time the area had gone 22 days without rain, whereas the average annual rainfall is 13 feet a year. A good part of Alaska falls within what is deemed a rain forest. Ironically, in other ports huge amounts of rainfall were evident.
We grabbed a bite to eat in downtown Anchorage and it was not long before it was time to leave for the airport and head home. But it’s a trip that I will remember forever.
